Exploring co-creation with agri-food smallholders in Vietnam

The food system in Vietnam is changing whilst the middle class is growing. Agrifood smallholders have the strengths of responding to the changing needs of the middle class by offering freshness, proximity and convenience but they also face increasing competition from larger and international firms. At the same time, issues with food safety are...

Increasing data sustainability: a behavioural approach

In a matter of decades, information technologies have become omni-present in the lives of more than a billion people. Whilst holding many promises for more efficient and therefore seemingly more sustainable practices, this fast-growing industry is expanding its footprint rapidly. Exponential advancements in hardware and software are kept in...

Gamified apps for sustainable consumption: A systematic review

Mobile apps are ubiquitous, affecting our everyday practices because “there is always an app for that”. In this vein, there have been a significant number of apps devised to support people’s lifestyles to make them more sustainable. This study aims to draw an overview of gamified mobile apps for sustainable consumption. Following a systematic...

Contaminated by Its Prior Use: Strategies to Design and Market Refurbished Personal Care Products

Refurbishment is an effective circular strategy to lengthen a product’s lifetime. However, refurbished products that are intimately used, such as personal care products, cause a feeling of unease in consumers because they are perceived to be contaminated. In 15 in-depth online interviews with female users of intense pulsed light (IPL) device...

Consumer adoption of access-based product-service systems: The influence of duration of use and type of product

Access-based product-service systems (AB-PSS) are business models that can potentially decouple the satisfaction of consumer needs from environmental impacts. Hence, they have been promoted for the circular economy. Their sustainability potential has not yet been realised because consumer adoption is lagging. Although this challenge has been...

Veggie-Table: Designing an inspiring tool to encourage the consumption of leftover vegetables at home

Food waste is the fastest growing issue of our time. Countries in the EU discard an estimated 89 million tons of food every year. Worse, the food waste will increase to about 126 million tons in 2020 if we do not take action (European Union Committee, 2014). Moreover, most countries are burying food waste in the landfills. This manner of...

Investigations Towards Developing Automated Energy Diagnostics and Prediction Models, Based on BMS Sensor Data Analysis

An investigation into energy optimization techniques for buildings was initiated that led to the development of a Toolbox with several functions for analysis, optimization and prediction techniques for thermal energy demand of a school building. The HHS, or The Hague University of Applied Sciences in Delft, was the most sustainable building for...

Policy options for sustainable protein consumption in the Netherlands

The Master's programme Industrial Ecology is jointly organised by Leiden University and Delft University of Technology.

Sustainable consumption and mindfulness: A proposed conceptual model and an empirical explorative study

This thesis was set out to explore the links between mindfulness and consumption, and specifically to gain clarity on how mindfulness impacts household consumption patterns. This to provide insights into whether mindfulness could be a constructive approach to sustainable consumption that would increase personal well-being and reduce...

Developments in European Ecodesign Policy and the Prospects for Design for Sustainable Practices

European ecodesign policy is currently bringing material resource efficiency into focus. This paper explores how and to what extent policy addresses sustainable consumption-related issues, and what the consequences may be for the future role of design in supporting sustainable everyday consumption. How will policy help and hinder designers and...

Pathways, Transitions and Backcasting for low-carbon and sustainable lifestyles: Introduction and overview

On 7-8 October, the InContext project, in collaboration with the Low Carbon at Work and the CRISP projects and SCORAI Europe, convened a two-day workshop on Pathways, Transitions, Backacasting for sustainable and low-carbon lifestyles.Workshop proceedings have just become available as SCORAI workshop proceedings on the SCORAI website at http:/...

Community gardens as learning spaces for sustainable food practices

Urban agriculture is an emerging topic and it is widely argued that it has considerable potential for sustainable consumption and production. Community gardening is a promising type of urban agriculture and questions have been raised like whether it has additional benefits for sustainable lifestyles and behavior, and we can understand community...

Measurement, Control and Reduction of DSM Carbon Footprint by Developing and Implementing a Sustainable Office Model within DFS: Green Office Ecological Model "GO-ECO"

The world will be faced with the challenge of accommodating nine billion people for 2050; the question is if our planet will have the resources necessary to provide a healthy and comfortable way of living for its habitants. That is why sustainability is important for DSM, and sustainability means “meeting the needs of the present without...

A conceptual model for the development of household sustainable consumption indicators

Despite the diversity of tools to measure household consumption, indicators are one of the approaches with great potential, due to their communication and comprehensible easiness for non-scientific public, like families. The main objective of this research was the development of a framework to define the main steps and criteria to built...

Reclaiming consumption: Quality, quantity, sustainability

It is surely beyond doubt that current consumption trends are socially unjust and environmentally unsustainable. Scientists and practitioners who argue for sustainable consumption need not continue to theorize the environmental consequences of overconsumption; rather, emphasis should now be directed towards creating the changes in culture,...

The role of environmental education in sustainable consumption and lifestyle: Survey results in Hungarian higher education and high schools

Environmental education is expected to have significant influence on environmental awareness, everyday lifestyle and consumer behavior of the participants. Our paper aims to explore how content, intensity and ways of environmental education reflect in the knowledge, values, attitudes and actual behavior of university students and high school...

Strong sustainable consumption and degrowth

Based on the analysis how the political and scientific discourses on Sustainable Consumption developed during the last two decades the paper develops the concept of Strong Sustainable Consumption Governance. Next to an emphasis that Sustainable Consumption has to consider resource consumption (including the available sink capacity of the...

Missing carbon reductions?: Exploring rebound and backfire effects in uk households

Households are expected to play a pivotal role in reducing the UK’s carbon emissions, and the Government is targeting specific household actions as part of its plan to meet the legally binding targets set out in the Climate Change Act 2008. However, by focusing on discrete actions, the Government fails to take account the Rebound Effect – a...